Lenni's Fourth Journal Entry (Disaster on Wheels)
In the Ghostwriter book Disaster on Wheels, Lenni had written in her journal. The fourth journal entry was written in the evening of the third day of the bike tour. WEDNESDAY, 9:35 P.M. The storm’s over. The temperature’s dropped about a zillion degrees; it’s as if the rain washed all the heat out of the air. I’m wearing my jeans plus two sweaters, can you believe it? By the way, this funny thing happened while we were waiting for the storm to stop. It was about seven o’clock, and we all were going a little stir-crazy in the tent. Mr. Velasquez was making people tell stories, to pass the time. They were all pretty boring, except for this one Mr. V. told about the history of Camp Wainwright—where we’re headed. According to him, it used to be the house of a really rich man named Cooper Morgan Wainwright. This is was his summer house; his main house was in Brooklyn. Anyway, Mr. Wainwright died last year (he was eighty-five!). He left his summer house to the city of Brooklyn. He wanted it to be a sleepaway camp for city kids—like us. Mr. Wainwright had nobody else to leave his house to; Mr. V. told us that Mr. Wainwright’s fiancée was killed a few days before their wedding, and he never married or had children after that. He lived all by himself until he died. Anyway, after Mr. V. was done with this story, Jamal wanted to know where Mr. Wainwright used to live in Brooklyn. Mr. V. said he lived on Portland Street, right in our neighborhood. He added that Mr. Wainwright’s brownstone was vandalized just last week. Nothing was taken from it, but two of his stained-glass windows were broken. I was listening to all this, and a lightbulb went off in my head. Portland Street . . . stained-glass windows . . . I got all excited and reminded everybody about the little glass heart I found last Wednesday on Portland Street, in front of a beautiful brownstone. There was some silver-colored metal around it, just like you see in stained-glass windows. I said that maybe it was from one of Mr. Wainwright’s stained-glass windows. Fiona got really interested in the heard—I guess because she’s an artist. She asked to see it, like it was a really big deal. I told her that I had put it in the junk pile for the camp Prospect campers to make art projects with. But then all the art projects got trashed by someone, so the heart was probably in the garbage somewhere. That’s when Jimmy confessed that he had taken the heart from the pile right before class. He though it was cool-looking, and he wanted to keep it for himself. But then he traded to Hector for a Roberto Clemente baseball card. He thought Hector was going to make a key chain out the heart. Weird, huh??? I find this thing on the street, and it turns out it might be a piece of Mr. Wainwright’s stained-glass window! The same Mr. Wainwright whose house we’re going to on Friday! I wonder if Hector still had the heart? We’ll have to ask him when we see him on Friday. Yawn! (That was me yawning!) It’s almost ten, and I’m beat. I’d better get plenty of rest so I’m ready for another day of cycling. Category:Book Journal Entries